


Picnic Day

by Gilli_ann



Category: Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Divorce, F/M, Gen, Introspection, Marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-04-14
Packaged: 2018-10-18 15:10:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10619517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gilli_ann/pseuds/Gilli_ann
Summary: Ennis does come back home in time for the church picnic. Alma ponders her marriage and her options.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: They do not belong to me, but to Annie Proulx and Focus Features. I intend no copyright infringement and make no profit.

**Morning: the return**

Alma wakes early, the room in half-light. The girls are up already. She hears them in the living room; rapid breathless whispers, the rattle of curtains being drawn aside. 

Their delight in seeing the truck parked outside is audible, though they try their best to be good, to behave and be quiet. 

“See! I knew it!” 

“Daddy's back!” 

“Told you he’d make the picnic, Jenny.” 

She sits up in bed, rubs a hand across her eyes, and looks over at the quietly breathing form beside her. He came home so late, she was already asleep. Nearly didn’t notice him coming to bed, though she knows she instinctively honed in on his body heat in the night, turning to the solidly real feeling of her husband back in their bed where he belongs. 

Now he’s sprawled on his back, his body relaxed in contented and exhausted sleep. Her mind skitters away from contemplating the reason for his exhaustion. She has taught herself firmly to think around his fishing trips, as if he simply dissolves into thin air while he’s gone.

His head is turned away from her on the pillow. She’s left with his soft golden-brown curls, but no face for her to read while it's left open and defenseless in slumber. The nearest of his strong hands is resting palm down on his chest, directly over his heart – as if protecting it. 

Alma's first reaction upon waking and seeing him next to her, unguarded and at rest, is still a brief rush of tenderness. Memories linger around the edges of her mind, the sweetness of hope and happiness. At second glance, though, it all turns to vague but unpleasant bitterness, the gall of however many disappointments pursing her lips and pulling her brows down into a frown. 

“Yes, your daddy’s here,” she thinks in silent reply to the girls’ happy chatter. “He’s here, sure enough. But has he really come back to us?”

 

**Evening: fight or flight**

She’s always been the practical and down-to-earth sort, never given to fanciful imaginings or fairy-tale fantasies. Her dreams stretch as far as a caring, industrious husband, kids, a nice little house and a life built around family and friends. She never wanted to become a movie star, or to marry a millionaire, or to travel the world, or any such unattainable nonsense. She just wanted ordinary, everyday, simple,small-town love and happiness. 

Even so, the late movie makes her ponder, as she sits listlessly watching it because she can’t sleep. It’s fantastic and fanciful all right - the kind of story she never has had any patience for. Some kind of war or alien invasion, catastrophe scenes, distorted shapes, terrified people screaming, fighting and falling. Emotions expressed in exaggerated gestures make up for the visual limits of the small screen’s black and white reality. 

“They probably love their town, their lives there,” she thinks. “It’s all they’ve got, so of course they’re fighting and not backing down now it’s being destroyed.” 

Some characters are hurt and some are dying noisily, a house burning in the background. But she knows she can expect a happy ending, the homes and town rebuilt, tears of remembrance, of gratitude and joy, the babies saved. It’s after all the standard fare of all such movies. 

In the flickering light from the TV, her gaze turns inwards to the dark corners of her mind. She recalls Monroe's face, hears his voice repeating the kind, trite nothing words he spoke to her at the picnic. _Nice weather, girls sure looking fine, delicious pie, see you tomorrow._

Her unseeing eyes, tired and dry, remain focused on the screen and the scenes of mayhem. 

“They're fighting to protect the only place they have,” she thinks. “But if they had a nice and snug safe haven to flee to, what then? Would they give up their fight? Move on? Abandon their burning homes as a lost cause, grab any remaining possessions, mourn the place they lived and loved, the loss of their beloved ones, overcome the pain, and start over?” 

Another beautifully coiffed woman screams desperately on the screen, with white teeth and perfect lipstick, wild and horrified black-rimmed eyes - dying.


End file.
